A time capsule of the greatest financial mania in the history of mankind, told in real-time by regular folks and patriots. May future generations better understand the madness of crowds, and how power and money corrupt.

I'd put it into my business - marketing, equipment upgrades, etc. I get a pretty consistent 400% ROI on my marketing dollars which is more than I can say for any other "investment" where you hope to earn 5% or 10% or whatever.

If I got just free money? First, I would take half and pay off some of my mortgage. Not necessary, but it'd feel good. Of the 125,000 still left - I'd invest $75,000 very diversified. I'm basically a safe type of person. Of the $75,000 left, I'd use $20,000 to fix every last thing in my home to my liking. $55,000 left. I'd give $30,000 to charity. Half to an environmental charity like the National Resources Defense Comittee and half to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. $25,000 left. That would be my fantastic fund. I'd just use it to do random awesome things. Like give some random anonymous money to my athelete friends. Pay for someone's coffee behind me. I'dlove to set up a board with names on it. Then close my eyes and throw a dart. And just do something cool for whomever's name was hit.

I can kick myself for missing the opportunity to short financials and home builders a year ago, as there was no doubt that what's happening now could be easily predicted at the time. The handwriting was on the wall, but I snoozed and missed out on the opportunity, primarily as I tend to be cautious.

Now I'm not one of those run-for-the-hills survivalists who thinks we're going to hell in a handbasket, but I recently bought gold (GLD). The innovation of ETFs have really simplified owning gold, since you don't have to store it, pay service fees, etc. You just buy GLD shares through your standard brokerage accounts. Couldn't be simpler.

So why gold? Well, we're all pretty sure that the Fed will continue to drop interest rates (50 bp in the bag, with a possibility of 75 bp), thus debasing our currency (which is well underway, with the dollar down to 60% of it's peak value only a few years ago). Seems like a pointless vein attempt to address the current situation, as the conundrum has no solution.

Gold has risen about 30% in the last few months alone. Will it keep moving upwards? We'll find out, but I see nothing standing in the way.... Heck, even permabull Cramer says gold has alot of upside potential.

Entering the 2008 reporting season, I think the volatility and further bad news in the weeks ahead will only drive people to look for greater asset protection.... Commodities and precious metals are good hedges in recessionary times, and people will be buying more.

10% A variety of forex like the Renminbi and Swiss Franc and Canadian Dollar. Actual cash on hand.10% Gold coins pre-1933. On hand.10% Savings Bonds. On hand.30% Treasuries laddered to smooth payout.40% In the market playing the shorts.

Physical securities in a deposit box in Texas or California.

Then I would move to Mexico and manage my portfolio online. Improve my Spanish.

Gold is already over valued, this bubble will pop like all bubbles before did...this time it's different, yeah right.Since we're going to ferment our food supply to keep our gas guzzlers on the road farming has a bright future. Why not buy some good farm land with it. Make sure the soil quality is high (less fertilizer) and you don't need (much) irrigation. At least you can do something with the land, like grow food on it. What are you going to do with gold once TSHTF? Can't eat it, its not used much in industry either.

Stick it in the bank as a basis to get credit cards, and blow every damn dime of it on useless bling to impress the neighbors. BUT, it would all be on cc/installment payments, so I could actually buy about 2.5 Million in goods(leverage ya know!,) especially with cards that offer no payments/finance charges for 6/12 months (getting a LOT of those offers lately.) I figure a year from now, this country will be in such bad shape, it won't matter anyway, and the banks will take a payment of a dollar a month just to keep more bad debt off the books (any payment is better than no payment.)

If worst comes to worst,the first couple of months after the first cc default notice, sell EVERYTHING at auction, house included, bury the worthless dollars in mason jars out in the woods, and become a bum!

Oh damn, that's right, I'm married! I guess I'll just invest it as wisely as I can and go on with life then (sigh.)

There’s a thread topic for all the Hp faithful Keith. Forget friends and co-workers, how do your spouses rate on the idiot scale, HPer's, enlightened or ostrich, even after all you have told them.

Assuming that you're giving me this money for some kind of service or product that I gave you (or something outstanding that my kids did...)

I'd send my kids to college, and invest and give away the rest. I'd still expect them to earn part of their way through scholarships and work.

Then, the money that I didn't have to spend on college, I would spend on my wife and me, since we've already made quite a few sacrifices to homeschool them.

I do plan on sending my kids to college; they just may not get to go the exact one they want to. I plan on taking Dave Ramsey's advice and not letting them go into debt to go to college. I think it would be better to go to one of the decent state universities (in Missouri) than to go into debt to go to a private college or out of state college that they want to go to. I've told them that they can go anywhere where they can earn enough scholarships to cover the difference from what we can pay in cash. If they don't like that, well, then, they could have just studied and worked a little harder to earn scholarships or money to go to their "dream" school.

In some people's eyes, that probably makes us terrible parents. But Dave Ramsey likes to say (something like this): 15% of what you become is what school you go to... 85% of what you become is how hard you work while you are there.

I would get out of debt, buy a piece of land I am looking at to build a house for my wife and I, give 10% to a charity I work for and then what ever is left put into an index fund to sit there for retirement in 20 years or so.

Three FDIC insured liquid accounts with the intent of purchasing a home (my first homedebtorship) within six months. $250k is about 45% of the "bubble-poster-child" down the street (> 1 year on market) and I think it is price is inflated ....45% or so. I'd buy it at a fair price, the $250k would vanish into the ether, but I'd have (be in reasonable debt for) a house.

If knowing what I know from HP I would use $250k free money to do such a thing, image what bailed-out homedebtors would do if we start throwing money at this problem!

I would move in to a nice apartment in the Washington's Crossing area of Pennsylvania and have breakfast, lunch and perhaps dinner out at least four times per week. I would also regularly visit the local wineries and insure their continued prosperity by imbibing frequently.The money would basically be conservatively placed in a CD and the interest used. There is no legitimate reason these days to save it because we may not be living very well in the near future and I am already in my 50s

It's a loaded question as it is your money not mine to lose. So, naturally, I am not going to care about losing your money as much and would take more risk. Do I have to maintain the principal?

It seems everything is in a bubble (even everyone's precious gold and silver), so I really don't know. Before today I was thinking that shorting all the foo foo stocks (williams sonoma, pottery barn, (which apparently are one in the same), abercrombie, SBUX, etc.) would be good or that buying up all the blue collar stocks (McD's, Costco, BJ's) as the first thing to go is discretionary spending and people start bargain shopping. And, as of today, they would have done pretty well- williams sonoma down 14%, SBUX down a few weeks back, McD's up, Costco up. Costco looks bubbly though, BJ's has been flat- maybe their new CEO will do something.

So, the above and buy some property in a rural area on a lake and grow some hops and maybe grapes.

I thought the gist of the question was "tax free" as opposed to... TAXABLE!?

Since this would CATAPULT nearly every last one of us into the AMT our answers would probably change quite a bit, no?

But then again this is the fantasy the RE Boom so generously enabled. Tax Free Money to do with as you please! Why worry if you p!ssed it away? Just buy ANOTHER "primary" residence and be a little more conservative next time. Or NOT!

Keith, if you gave me $250K, the first thing I would do would be to thank you and buy you a pint.

Since I am in the process of buying the 2.5 acres adjacent to my home (which I own free and clear and is also on 2.5 acres), and expect to close on the property this week, the timing couldn’t be better and I would just pay it off.

Since it looks as if gold still has some “upside potential,” I would put the remaining $100K into that, cross my fingers, and then sell the gold in ~3 months. (Gambling, yes – but the odds are that it will not drop to $0/oz anytime soon.)

I would then take this money and use it to excavate and mount the Columbia mammoth skeleton which is buried on my property, construct a small building to house & display it in, and open a small plant shop/nursery/museum. Since I already have a small plant business and have figured out how to make money off growing things, it would not be too difficult to increase its size, and the display would help to pull in the customers. It wouldn’t make me rich, but it would pay the bills.

And then I could quit my day-job and run the shop & nursery full-time, thus eliminating the daily commute to Seattle and greatly improving my quality of life.

Because THAT’s what the $250K is really for: it is a once-in-a-lifetime windfall to use to improve one’s situation in life, isn’t it?

I am SO against giving ANY money for ANY type of research. In over 30 years of "research" the number of cancers has dropped by less than 1%.

That's pathetic!

And why should it be different? If you were a lab tech making 60K a year doing "research" and one day you discovered the cure-all for cancer... would you ever tell anyone, or would you just pour it down the drain?

Because as soon as you provide the cure - you and all the other lab techs are out of your cushy jobs. Who's going to pay your mortgage then?

The best way is to just make a jackpot of a billion dollars and give it to the first schmuck that can PROVE that his drug can CURE whatever disease we're talking about. And by cure - I mean complete remission of the disease for more than 50% of the patients with no relapses for at least 10 years.

use it to pay income taxes.. have more than that coming in annually from passive income activity as retired in my early 40s while managing investments.250k is not really a lot of money...neither is 2.5 ml...25 mil is more like it.

I'll put the dough into this excellent business opportunity I've been secretly told about in Nigeria. All I have to do is send a copy of my passport, my bank account numbers, the 1/4 mil to Ms. Fielding Kevlin via (1) SPECIAL CASH PAYMENT or (2) SWIFT/TELEGRAPHIC WIRE TRANSFER and I'll get half of my CONTRACT/INHERITANCE FUNDS PAYMENT - REF:WB/NF/UN/XX027 - for USD $17,500,000.

You gold investors are suckers. These returns will beat anything metals will do.

I have this much in a Credit Union account earning 4.45%. I have no fucking idea what to do with it. I'm terrified of everything. Recently I've been looking at GLD. Would it be wise to put some money into this?

(BTW, by account is a Pay-on-Death type, with 3 beneficiaries, insured up to $300k by NCUA)

I would pay cash for a small farm5-15 acres with an outbuilding/barnthat could be converted (half maybe)into a dorm for refugee family members. The area would have to grownice variety of food, with rainfallof 30-34 inches minimum, and I wouldput in a roof rainwater system anda cistern or two, maybe small bankof water collectors in basement. Iwould stock it with chickens andturkeys, nice wool lambs, a burroor two, generator, and seeds, lotsof open pollinated seeds of whichI would store a good amount invacuum sealed bags in freezer. Oh,and I'd have a dugout food cellar.Basic first aid stuff, good reference books,lifetime supply ofaspirin, neosporin, betadine, etc.And as many cords of wood as I could lay my hands on so of coursea nice stove that can be used for heat and cooking (ie soapstoneeuro type model). So it would bean older house, not remodeled nevermind the frigging granite counters.Of course I already have a loom,2 spinning wheels, grain grinder,elots of cast iron (good source ofiron)...Supplies and tools, non-electric...grandma

Hold enough in reserve to pay off my mortgage....invest it in stocks. (Before you guys go apeshit....I was a stockbroker for a while. Stocks are what I understand....not gold, not bonds, not real estate. Investing in something you don't understand is the shortest way to getting spanked. Besides, there are always some good deals in the market, you just have to stop being lazy and go look for them.) That's about 113k spoken for. If it makes financial sense to pay off the mortgage, we'll do it with this chunk of cash. If not, we'll let it ride for a while.

Put around 50k into my boy's 529 plan. He's 15 months old right now, so it's got plenty of time to grow.

Pay off the car loan. That takes about 13k.

Take another 50k just for family use. Maybe see if my brother could use it for his little girl's medical expenses, or if my in-laws could use some help with their bills.

Make annual contributions to our Roths.

Invite our benefactor over for one hell of a BBQ or sushi pig out (his choice....hell, it's the least we could do, right?)

Take 10k and give it to the National Downs' Syndrome Association in honor of my niece, the sweetest and bravest little girl I have ever known.

And....blow the remainder on some stupid mindless shit! ;)

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anon @ 3:52

Not being familiar with the ins and outs of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, but...

Many of those charities spend most of their money helping people who suffer from those diseases, not so much on the research. We got some wonderful help from the Cancer Society and H & R Bloch's cancer charity (I forget the name and am too lazy to check what it's called now) when my mother got terminal cancer. I'm not sure what they spend on research, but it's a lot less than on the social work aspect of it all.

As for leukemia, depending on the type, it's no longer an automatic death sentence like it was when I was a kid. There's more progress being made on that disease than you might be aware of.

The number of cancers isn't really budging, mainly because people are stupid and continue to pig out and smoke. But the survival rate is higher for most of them, including the one that killed my mother back in the late 80's. If she were alive today, she might have a chance. Back then she had zero chance.

Besides, how do you think they are ever going to get a cure if they don't investigate meds that look promising but turn out to be ineffective after further study? You can't just rig something up and have a guaranteed cure. That's the movies, buddy, not how research works.

And why should it be different? If you were a lab tech making 60K a year doing "research" and one day you discovered the cure-all for cancer... would you ever tell anyone, or would you just pour it down the drain?

that's just complete bullshit.

(There are PhD educated 'lab techs' who make well under $60k, btw).

Yes, you'd tell your boss, get a patent, and form a startup. Your boss woudl get rich and you'd get a faculty job.

The researchers are working their asses off. The reason cancer is hard is because it's hard. You are evolutionarily stuck between cancer and procreation---a really high immune response which would kill cancers will also kill your fetus.

Cancer isn't any one disease anyway, it's "all the crap that can happen when you disrupt a genome".

"I notice almost none of you said charity. Nothing but invest in this or that and make money. Not even, and I'll throw the SPCA or Goodwill or United Way $10K of it."

Hey Rube, F*ck public charity, that is one of the many corrupt reasons we are where we are. Public Charity, Entitlements, coddling illegal alien felons,especially MEXICANS, anchor babies, etc, etc, etc, etc.

To stay realistic I'd not start thinking about how to use a quarter-million unless I receive one. First point, anyway, would be to diversify, both geographically and structurally.

Now, here's an idea for a new poll - what if you were handed $250k personally by Ben Bernanke:(a) I'll burn it. Let the deflation begin.(b) I'll exchange it for the stable currency of my country (EUR, CHF, JPY) which I'll return to Ben, out of sympathy.(c) I'll deposit it with Ben at 4% p.a. Isn't the Central Bank a bank after all? Ben, you owe me $260k next year!(d) I'll use it to trim my debt. There's no choice!(e) I'll take a picture of Ben handing me money and make another $250k publicizing the event, and then perhaps another wad of dough as forex markets go mad over the news.(f) I'll not accept it. You only lend money for collateral so please go cheat somebody else.

Hey Rube, F*ck public charity, that is one of the many corrupt reasons we are where we are. Public Charity, Entitlements, coddling illegal alien felons,especially MEXICANS, anchor babies, etc, etc, etc, etc.

CHARITY STARTS AT HOME AS*HOLE.

Thank you. Finally someone took a shot at these "charity crowd" that have nothing to retire on but keep mentioning "charity" all the time just to look holy.

The only charity feasible is performing free vasectomies on these bunch of third world country losers who keep crying about how impoverished they are, even though they're strong enough to breed like flies. I say the hell with it and lets sterilize all these parasites until the situation gets under control. That's my charity.

Being that this is the biblical LAST HOUR, I would buy property far from the city life,and prepare to live off the land(Mad Max scenario is about to take over the cities). With the rest of the money,all in silver and gold which I will keep in my possession(that is until the silver and gold is cast out into the streets as worthless).

Stuck in pa has it down pat.I got to explain to my dumb wife and her equally dumb big mouthed mother why we are still renting at least every other day.Bitch in law always wants toknow when I'm gonna get her precious offspring into a home of her own and out of a rental. Speaks the word rental like it carried ebola or something.

I would put it in the bank with the million dollars I already have there @ 5%. I don't care about inflation becuse I only buy what I need and I save way more than the current inflation rate. I also hope we get that tax reform package, you know the one that only taxes you on your purchases. And anyone who thinks dollars are going to be worthless, you can go ahead and send them to me because I collect them.

sell oil (too many momentum traders + economic slowdown) gold is good but it will see a pullback, broker stocks by this summer will be good value for a 50% pop given a 2yr time horizon. buy yen due to carry unwind and general risk adversion. sorry if this sounds dry but im a trading professional.

"But Dave Ramsey likes to say (something like this): 15% of what you become is what school you go to... 85% of what you become is how hard you work while you are there."

Anytime someone quotes Dave Ramsey I cringe. He admitted the other night that he was wrong about how bad the real estate crash would be and how bad Countrywide would get. That alone tells you he is hard headed and arrogant until he is forced to see the truth. He recommends only buying/selling real estate with a REALTOR.

I get it! Get out of debt. I am out of debt. I use my credit card CONSTANTLY and pay it off in full every month. I hope that makes his skin crawl! He's selling a brand, the Dave Ramsey brand. It was funny to hear Suze Orman say that anyone who doesn't advise paying off the highest interest credit card FIRST is an IDIOT. I'm sure she is well aware who that IDIOT is.

We sort of already did get $250 thousand. We withdrew that much from our 401Ks - which, like all 401Ks are NOT FDIC protected - and invested it partially in silver coins - now in a safe deposit box in the bank - remember that there are WAY more silver and gold shares floating around than has ever been mined in all of history, so buying shares of metals is a fools game.

We also partially invested it in real estate via paying off the mortgages on one of the two houses we own, the one which is a rental. (It is in a very good neighborhood, and once the mortgage is paid off - and this is only year three of the mortage - it will be a center of modest profit rather a cost center for us. This maneuver makes sense because since mortgage interest is frontloaded, paying it off in the first few years saves us a huge bundle, and furthermore, we expect taxes on pension funds such as 401Ks to skyrocket. Remember, when the politicians start screaming about the greedy investors and the need to raise the capital gains tax, they are talking about your pension funds. Your 401K is tax deferred not tax exempt. The stuff in our 401Ks was put into treasuries last June btw, and is doing very nicely. Of course we have set aside money to pay the taxes and penalty this year. However, I figure that it may be impossible to get money out of one's own 401K no matter the emergency in a few years, so this is worthwhile. We will have the other house (the one we live in) paid off this year or early next, since it is now our only debt, and we have stopped saving into our 401Ks and are saving in Series E bonds, and paying off the mortgage instead. We are only into year 2 of the mortgage on this house - which we got at a good price - so again, forgoing the tax deduction in order to avoid a bagload of interest is a great investment. Finally, we are putting in improved radiant barrier insulation, solar panels, demand water heaters, and other energy improvements into our home. We are also exploring aquaponics methods and are getting better at raising vegetables and chickens in our little half acre backyard. We figure that Victory gardens saved the nation during the depression and WWII and there may be a role for them again. And if not, gardening is a great hobby, and I like the concept of raising fish and vegetables in my study.

I would amass the ugliest looking thugs and develop our plans to conquer. I will make a gold plated G.W.B. mask and tell everyone that we come in peace. After a sigh of relief by the sheeple, the mayhem and pillaging begins.

'Fearful in "FLORIDA"' and collecting gold and silver..that's funny. I wish you well my friend and leave YOU with TWO words: HURRICANES and CORRECTIONS.And you might want to look up 'volatility'. And I suggest you use both a dictionary and a thesaurus and read very slowly and carefully, especially those adjectives.